


Midnight City

by 00__jun



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Desperation, Drinking, Late Night Conversations, M/M, New Year's Eve, No Plot/Plotless, Past Character Death, Running Away, Short
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-14
Updated: 2019-09-14
Packaged: 2020-10-18 10:56:50
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,953
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20638031
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/00__jun/pseuds/00__jun
Summary: In the middle of the night, two lost souls find each other in the midst of chaos.





	Midnight City

**Author's Note:**

> Mention of past character's death so please be aware.
> 
> Yeah that's it... AHHHHHHH hope you enjoy!

Donghyuck hates the New Year-- especially the parties his friends drag him to year after year. They’re in the middle of nowhere, a dense forest surrounds the cabin bringing a somewhat eerie feeling to the vibe of the party. If it were some other time, Donghyuck thinks he’d find this location peaceful. 

As the music blares from the 5-foot speakers, he feels the old wooden wall he’s leaning against vibrating against his frame. Looking out the window past the DJ, he stares at the huge glasshouse glistening from the moonlight. He almost feels bad that the rich neighbors have to endure this every year. 

At 10:30, Donghyuck's head hurts. The corner he’s been hiding at the entire time is becoming too suffocated. 

“You wanna dance?” some kid from his class yells over the music, blinking rapidly to try and focus his vision. The huge stain on his shirt and the red solo cup he has loosely in his grip say enough about his intoxicated state-- Donghyuck politely declines. 

With a simple, “Whatever,” the boy heads off into the dance floor, quickly wrapping his arm around someone’s waist. 

“Have you actually been here the whole time?” Jaemin yells over the music as he walks over to him. He takes a moment to glance at the dance floor, then looks back at Donghyuck and shakes his head disapprovingly. Donghyuck catches the subtle slur between his words. He’s not drunk, but he’s getting there. 

“Kind of,” Donghyuck shrugs, suddenly feeling small. The room begins to feel cold, so he tugs on his blue flannel in hopes that it brings him some warmth, “not really my scene.” 

Jaemin scoffs and downs the drink he has in his hand. Donghyuck knows what he’s about to say. He begins to wish he had just stayed home.

“We dragged you here so you can have fun and not be in that hell hole you have to call home. Drink a little, dance, hook up with someone- get your mind off of all the shit that’s going on. You never tell us anything, you might as well let loose. You deserve to let yourself have fun.” Donghyuck's throat burns at his words. He tries to say something in response but no words come out of his mouth. Instead, Jaemin gives him one last drunkenly beaming grin before walking back toward the drinks table, turning back one last time to yell over the blaring music. 

“Do something crazy Haechannie, it’s the New Year!! Who knows? Your life might change tonight!” 

At 10:45 Donghyuck finds himself walking towards the nearby lake. He tried to go all out, but the closer he got to the drinks table the dizzier he felt. The heat radiating off of the sweating bodies dancing around him burned his skin. And instead of making a right to the makeshift bar, he made a left out the door. 

Once he sees the glistening lake, he sees a figure sitting on a foldable chair, strumming a sweet melody from his acoustic guitar. In any other situation, he would have turned back around and sucked it up at the party. But at this moment, the mere thought of the smell of alcohol is enough to make him walk towards the unknown figure. 

When he sits on the dried grass beside the guy, he doesn’t bother to spare a glance. He plays his guitar uninterrupted until he finishes. It’s silent for a couple of seconds. In the distance, Donghyuck hears the bass thumping, a song he’s heard a couple of times serving as background noise for them. Yet the sound is oddly deafening, he’s certain the music is being played too slow-- it’s taking forever to end. 

“I’m assuming you’re from the party?” the guy asks in a way that comes off as a statement. 

“Yeah… yeah, I need a breather,” Donghyuck replies, his throat oddly dry. “How about you? What are you doing here?”

“I live here.” he scoffs. The guy closes his eyes and leans back on his chair, letting the night breeze pass through. Donghyuck stares at the glimmering water, it’s entrancing. His mind wanders several places and he doesn’t realize as he begins to speak. 

“It’s 11 pm on New Year's Eve and you’re sitting here playing guitar by a lake."

“It’s 11 pm on New Year's Eve and you’re sitting here listening to me play guitar by a lake.” Neither of them move, afraid of breaking the peace they’ve obtained over the course of a short few sentences. But the guy's mouth is faster than his brain. “You ever just feel like you don’t belong?”

Donghyuck notices the way his voice comes off at desperate, perhaps hoping that finally, someone will share the feelings he’s bottling up. He tunes in to the music in the background, remembering the way sweaty bodies surrounded him in the home. He can hear Jaemin’s laugh in the back of his head, enjoying himself, downing another mixed drink of whatever cheap alcohol they got their hands on. “Why do you think I needed a breather?” 

He sighs and points to the glasshouse Donghyuck had been staring at earlier. In response, he shifts his body as a response, turning to an angle where he can see him, the house, and the huge lake. “You see that huge glass house?” Donghyuck nods, admiring the way the glass was illuminated by the moonlight, “that’s mine.”

“Are you… complaining?” Donghyuck asks slowly, turning to get a good look at him for the first time. He gaps a little, immediately noticing his beauty despite the darkness that surrounds them. But quickly he turns back to the matter at hand and raises an eyebrow at him as he waits for a response. 

“No.” he says firmly, not breaking sight of his home. Donghyuck knows he’s lying, but he doesn’t say anything, he lets him soak in his own words until he’s ready.

“I want to sing,” he confesses, finally turning to look at him. His gaze is desperate, a hint of hope that maybe he’s what he needs to make his dream come true. But Donghyuck is just Donghyuck. 

“I’m not stopping you.” Donghyuck teases as an effort to lighten the mood. The guy gives a genuine chuckle and pauses, looking down at the guitar placed on his lap. He begins to lowly strum, no notes in specific, he just strums to produce the most basic notes. 

“I mean... like for the rest of my life. My parents don’t want that, they want me to run their business. I don’t want to run a fucking business for the rest of my miserable life. I want to be on stage.” Donghyuck nods in acknowledgment-- silent solidarity.

The longer he stares at the water, the more his throat becomes dry. He feels the weight of everything he’s been holding in slowly crushing him. It’s almost like he’s drowning. His mind tunes back to the party and the previous conversation with Jaemin that keeps replaying in his head over and over and over again. 

“My parents died when I was 4. Car accident... Or something.” Donghyuck chokes out, “Been in and out of homes my entire life. My current home has 12 kids. Folks are nice, I guess. But they care more about what the government compensates them for having all of us.” 

He hears the guy’s breath hitch followed by an immediate, “I’m sorry.”

Donghyuck wants to tell him that it’s not his fault, just some twisted game of fate. Fate. God damn, he hates what fate has planned for him. He wants to scream out into the universe, cuss out every single living entity, and then scream _ at _ the universe-- for making him go through hell and back his whole life and not giving him a single fucking break. 

But he knows it’s no use, which is why he deals with his problems and then proceeds to ignore the hell out of them. He’s just thankful for some of the weight that’s lifted off his chest, letting him catch a single breath for the first time in years. “I thought we were sharing our problems free of judgment.”

“Oh.” the guy pauses, nodding slowly, “Yeah... we are doing that." 

They fall back into a peaceful silence. They've somehow managed to completely block out the music in the background and instead let themselves be serenaded by the crickets chirping in the night. Time seems to slow… or speed up-- Donghyuck can’t tell. All he knows is that they sit there in silence, giving the night a moment to talk. 

“Mark.” the guy says slowly, blending his voice with the sounds of nature, “My name’s Mark.”

“Donghyuck,” he replies. 

A voice cuts through the music, abruptly causing the noise coming from the party to go silent. The music never turns back on, instead, it’s replaced with the chanting of people counting down from 60. 

“Do you ever want to run away?” Mark hurriedly asks, sitting up straight and turning his body to face Donghyuck. 

He peers behind his shoulder to look at the cabin. The lights are now all on and he can see Jaemin in the distance, Jeno clutched in his arm, taking yet another drink. He watches as Jeno whispers something that causes him to burst out in a fit of laughter. Then Renjun, Yukhei, Chenle, and Jisung come up to them and they huddle, laughing. Donghyuck laughs and looks up at the night sky. For the first time, he truly comes to terms with the vast complexity of the universe, and how fucking insignificant he is in the grand scheme of things. 

_ “40...” _

He turns to Mark and looks him in the eye, grabbing the look of hopelessness and embracing it. “All the god damn time.” 

_ “35…” _

“Let’s do it.” he stands, making sure to grab his guitar. He glances at the lake, then his house, then back at Donghyuck. He hears everyone counting down and it feels like a race against the clock. 

_ “33…” _

“What?” Donghyuck replies, standing up as well. He realizes Mark a couple of inches taller than him, not enough to where he has to peer up to look at him, but enough to where they’re not at eye level.

_ “30…” _

“Fuck Donghyuck, let's go. Leave this hell hole of a city behind. Follow our own individual dreams, free of judgment.” 

He knows he doesn’t mean for it to come off as a beg, but Mark’s tone is so shaky, Donghyuck's heart begins to race. 

“And go where?”

_ “20...” _

Mark pauses, clearly not having thought things through. He pulls out the keys from his pocket and fumbles with them until he unlocks his car. Donghyuck hears a faint beep in the distance followed by a light coming from the car that illuminates the area for a brief moment. “Wherever we feel is right.”

“So many things can go wrong.” he tries to reason, mostly with himself. Yet through his whole thought process, Donghyuck is unable to take his eyes off the car. 

_ “5… 4… 3…” _

_ “Do something crazy Haechannie, it’s the New Year!!” _

_ “1…” _

Donghyuck finally breaks his gaze, looking back at Mark, a newfound look in his dark eyes. _ “Who knows? Your life might change tonight!” _

“Let’s do it.” 

The moments after proceed in a blur. As they drive off into the night, Donghyuck watches the sky as fireworks illuminate their path. Mark turns to him, a smile forming from his eyes, “Happy New Year, Donghyuck.”

Donghyuck smiles as soon as his favorite song comes on the radio. As he leans forward to turn it up, he turns to Mark and breathes for what feels like the first time.

“Happy New Year.”


End file.
